Tomato Soup

This recipe came from Jane, a good friend. It makes about 24 pints of soup. Once you’ve made this soup you will have a hard time ever going back to the stuff in a can.

You will need about 25-30 pounds of tomatoes. Blanch them in boiling water to remove the skins. Measure out 12 quarts of cut up tomatoes.

Put the tomatoes in a very large kettle. Add seven large cut up onions, a dozen parsley sprigs and a dozen bay leaves. Cook this up for about two hours.

Get out your strainer. If you can’t find it, check the sandbox because they seem to make a great sand toy. Put the soup through the strainer. The stuff on the right goes on the compost pile. It takes out all the seeds and bay leaves. For this batch I just cut the onions up but look how much onion goes to waste. So for the next batch I put the onions through the food processor before adding them to the pot and that way they all went into the soup.

The pot goes back on the burner and using a low heat, bring it to a boil.

Now you need to make a roux for thickening the soup. Combine 1 1/2 cups of water and 1 1/2 cups of flour. Stir it really good until it is very smooth.

Add 1 1/2 cups of sugar, 12 teaspoons of salt and 1 Tablespoon of pepper to the soup.

Now this is where I screwed up the first time I made this. Add a couple of ladles of hot soup to your roux and whisk it really good. Then slowly stir this into the pot of soup. Keep whisking as you add the roux. If you don’t your soup will be full of little white lumps of flour.

Cook and stir until it thickens. This can take awhile but don’t quit stirring! And keep the heat as low as you can but still allow it to boil.

Cut two sticks of butter into cubes.

Add the butter to the pot and let this simmer for half an hour. Occasionally give it a stir. Remember to keep the heat very low.

Ladle the hot soup into jars. I like to use pints but you can do quarts if you want.

Process in a hot water bath for 15 minutes.

As I said, this soup is awesome. We like to heat it up and heat some milk or half & half separately. Serve the soup with the hot milk on the side to add in as you like.

TOMATO SOUP

12 quarts cut up tomatoes

7 large onions, cut up or processed

1 dozen parsley sprigs

1 dozen bay leaves

1 1/2 cups water

1 1/2 cups flour

12 teaspoons salt

1 tablespoon pepper

1 1/ 2 cups sugar

1 cup butter, cubed

Put tomatoes, onions, parsley and bay leaves into a large kettle. Cook for 2 hours and then strain. Combine flour and water to make roux. Add sugar, salt and pepper to soup. Combine a couple ladles of hot soup to roux and slowly whisk into soup. Continue cooking and stirring until thickened. Add butter to simmering soup and simmer for 1/2 hour, stirring occasionally.

Pour into sterilized jars and seal in hot water bath for 15 minutes. This makes about 24 pints of soup.

To serve: Heat soup and milk or half & half in separate pans. Serve by combining in a bowl.

Don’t forget to show hospitality to strangers, for some who have done this have entertained angels without realizing it. Hebrews 13:2